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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28772307">We’re giving love in a family dose</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/KiraLiven/pseuds/KiraLiven'>KiraLiven</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>I wasn't looking for a family, then I found you [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Voltron: Legendary Defender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Babysitting, Domestic Fluff, Family Fluff, Fluff, M/M, Multi, Parent Keith (Voltron), Parent Lance (Voltron), Post-Canon, family fic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 06:14:39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,752</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28772307</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/KiraLiven/pseuds/KiraLiven</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Keith, Lance, and Rachel get stuck babysitting four children on a sugar high. A heart-to-heart with Rachel causes Keith to think about how big he wants his family to grow.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Keith &amp; Lance's Family (Voltron), Keith &amp; Rachel (Voltron), Keith/Lance (Voltron)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>I wasn't looking for a family, then I found you [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2109489</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>116</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>We’re giving love in a family dose</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Title from "We Are a Family" by Sister Sledge</p>
<p>This is just a cute little one-shot in the Estrella universe! I really had no idea where this was going but enjoy!</p>
<p>This is set just a few months after the events of Estrella, I don't have a particular time although Stella can't quite talk yet and I had her in my head at around 11 months (but she seems maybe younger) for this. Alien baby development is pretty difficult to figure out</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Keith liked kids, he really did. And he loved the McClain kids in particular, partially because one of them was his daughter and they were all family, but also because they were really good kids and he had watched them grow up. But what he <em>didn’t</em> like were kids on a sugar high. Because they were; Tía Maria had oh-so-kindly provided her grandchildren—yes, even Stella—with candy and ice cream after they’d come back from the park, and then locked herself in the kitchen to make dinner while leaving her youngest children—Rachel and Lance, and by extension Keith himself—to deal with the aftermath.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">The first half-hour or so was fine, with Keith drawing with the girls and Rachel talking with Silvio about school. They’d tired themselves out sufficiently at the park already and were down to just sit semi-quietly for a while. But soon the sugar seemed to kick in, and after fidgeting restlessly for a while the older kids ran out of interesting stories and grew bored with the indoors. Nadia announced that she wanted to go outside and try her hoverboard again, which led Silvio to ask if he could play with Kosmo, and then of course Julia wanted to play with Kosmo too, even though the last time she’d done that she’d fallen off of Kosmo and started crying. Nadia was already waiting by the door impatiently while the adults exchanged glances trying to decide if the Kosmo-playing would be allowed, so Keith shrugged and handed Stella—who was still holding a large crayon that she had been scribbling with—to Rachel and headed out to supervise and teach Nadia, because she wasn’t allowed to hoverboard without an adult until Keith, as her teacher, deemed her good enough.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Behind him, Lance ordered the other two to follow him outside where they could go find Kosmo “and ask him if he’d like to play.” </span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">It was a testament to how much energy Nadia required, yelling for his attention and help in equal measure, zooming off the road into the fields haphazardly while he ran after her, that Keith didn’t even notice that he hadn’t seen Rachel and Stella in a while.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Lance,” he called worriedly to where Lance and Kosmo were, one eye still on Nadia trying to do a jump trick.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Stella’s with me here,” Lance yelled back, “Rach is inside cleaning up.” Translation: Rachel did not want to deal with the kids while they had this much energy.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Tío Keith look at this!” Silvio and Nadia shouted at the same time. Tío Keith silently vowed to hide the sweets next time they came.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Keith began to resent Rachel for finding a way out when Nadia and Silvio decided that they wanted to race, except with Nadia on the board and Silvio on Kosmo’s back, and before Keith could stop them, they’d shot off. Of course, this caused the abandoned Julia to run after them, yelling that she wanted to race too, and Lance had no hands to grab her, so Keith did, scooping her up easily despite her size and assuring her that the four of them could play instead.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Julia was inconsolable for a while, which made Stella cry either in sympathy or for more attention, until Keith took the baby and Lance somehow convinced Julia that playing some complex hand game would be just as fun as racing. So Lance got to teaching a still-tearful Julia a hand game while Keith was left with the baby—who, once she’d been settled in his arms, stopped crying and began babbling to him and trying to eat whatever she could grab from the ground—and a careful eye on the two spots in the distance. Nadia and Silvio were old enough to take care of themselves, although Nadia was still a bit shaky on her hoverboard, but Keith hoped that Kosmo would keep everyone safe or at least come get him if he had to, and not to worry as they got farther and farther away. When he looked back to check on Lance, feeling tired and a bit exasperated with the children, he found that Julia had decided she didn’t like the rules of the game and wanted to make her own, which included some foot-kicking-tapping-pattern as well as hand gestures and claps.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Really, Keith felt so old, watching how much energy the children had.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">When Nadia and Silvio turned back and started towards the house again without incident and Lance was looking a bit worn-down, Keith passed Stella—who had been bouncing up and down in his lap to the beat of whatever rhyme Julia had come up with—to Lance, who sat gratefully and propped Stella up by the armpits so she could continue to exercise her legs. Julia was not pleased by the change in partners, because apparently the game was very complicated and it took her a long time to teach Tío Lance, but Keith assured her that he would just try it out and she could tell him what he got wrong.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Julia was very pleased when she found that her Tío Keith had been paying attention to her game and knew all the steps. Keith was shocked how much brain-power it took to play this game literally made-up by a three year old.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">After a while, Stella began to get fussy, so Lance stood to return to the house and change her diaper, startling Julia when he stood.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Do we have to go back in, Tío Lance?” She asked.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Nah, I’ll send Tía Rachel out to watch your siblings, so you can keep playing with Tío Keith.” Keith allowed himself a brief moment where he contemplated switching with Lance and changing Stella’s diaper himself instead, but figured that would be too much fuss and the moment passed. Lance ruffled Julia’s hair, then carried a sniffle-y Stella back into the house, yelling for Rachel to get outside. </span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Lance was barely gone when Nadia and Silvio returned, breathless and grinning. Kosmo was panting as well, looking like he’d had a very good run, but Keith knew he must be tired, and told Silvio that it was time to let Kosmo rest. Fortunately, he listened. Unfortunately, that meant Silvio had to find something new to do.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">(Keith was not freaking out about being left with the majority of the kids, no, not at all, he was fine. He was outnumbered three to one, but Keith had helped topple an empire; he could watch three hyperactive children alone for five minutes.)</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">When Rachel finally came out to help Keith, Nadia had decided to teach Silvio how to ride her hoverboard and Keith was trying to watch out for them and call out pointers while also playing his game with Julia, trying not to show how stressed he was and very likely failing. (Hey, the first time he’d ridden a hoverboard he’d accidentally shot up three feet, lost balance, and fell on his head, causing a concussion that took forever to heal because no one at the foster home would let him rest. He’d kill himself before he let something like that happen to them.)</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Need some help?” Rachel teased, watching as Julia scolded him for a missed move again.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Yes, please,” Keith huffed. Lance would probably take the time inside to get everyone water after changing Stella, as well as food to feed Kosmo wherever he’d teleported off to, so he would be a while; Keith just hoped Rachel could keep an eye on Silvio during that time, because he wasn’t sure Nadia could—or would—catch him if he fell. </span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Rachel was good with kids—and had much more experience with them than Keith—but he found it difficult to relax without Lance around. So he was relieved when Lance returned with water, especially because the kids all dropped what they were doing in favour of staying hydrated, giving him a little break from Julia’s strange foot/hand game. Unfortunately, they still had half-an-hour before Lance’s other siblings—including the kids’ parents—would return from their various activities today, and an hour before dinner was supposed to start. But Keith was the only one of the three who hadn’t had a break yet, so he let Rachel take Stella and volunteered Lance for a makeshift game of two-on-two football, boys versus girls.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Keith was so caught up in watching them run around—Lance taking care not to hurt his niblings but not go <em>too</em> easy on Nadia, Julia trying to keep up with her older siblings, while Silvio went all-out—that he almost forgot about Rachel beside him, bouncing Stella up and down on her knee.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“They look like they’re having fun, aren’t they?” She asked, startling him out of his reverie. </span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Hm?” Keith turned to her, then back at the game when she inclined her head towards them. “Oh, yeah.” Keith grinned, “they look like they’re having lots of fun.” Ahead, Nadia scored another point against Silvio and Lance, and she and Julia did an impromptu victory-dance even though all Julia had done was “keep Tío Lance back”.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Lance is really good at this,” Rachel continued, “He’s definitely their favourite Tío.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Yeah…”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“They like you a lot, too,” Rachel added, and Keith blushed. “Silvio was so glad when we explained you’d be staying forever, that you were a proper part of the family.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“I was glad, too. I like them a lot.” Keith rolled his eyes, “even if they are a bit much, sometimes.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“I’m kind of curious, Keith. I mean, I know Lance has always wanted to be a father. But what about you? Was kids something you were looking for, or did Stella just capture your heart?”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Keith sighed and squinted against the setting sun, watching as Lance played keep-away from a frustrated—and much smaller, albeit growing—Nadia. “I wasn’t looking for kids,” he said slowly, “though I think I always wanted them. I… I always figured I’d be a bad father, since I only had one until the age of eight, and I struggled finding a home in the system. So I wasn’t looking, or even really hoping for them—I know Lance was always unashamed about wanting a family in the future, but I never really talked or even thought about it the way he did.” Keith shrugged, “it makes sense, though, what with the way he is with those three.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">They were quiet for a bit as Lance passed to Silvio and he made a goal, prompting a lot of annoyed pouting and victorious yelling from the players.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“He wants a big family, you know,” Rachel said once Nadia had gotten everyone to calm down and the play started again. “He always said he’d want more than one kid, because of how lonely he figured only children were.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Well you twins always have a hard time imagining being alone for even a day in your life, so that makes sense,” Keith joked, and Rachel laughed. “But yeah, I mean I’m sure there are only children who aren’t lonely, but… I definitely was.” Keith turned his head to look at Stella, who was watching the game with rapt attention, probably because of all the noise and motion. “I think… When the time is right, I mean, not anytime soon, I… wouldn’t mind finding Stella a sibling. If everything goes alright with her, of course,” he amended.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“It will,” Rachel reassured, “you and Lance are great dads, Keith.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Well, Lance is…”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“You are too. You’re probably their second-favourite Tío, and you’re so great with Stella.” Rachel looked back at the game, where Nadia and Julia must have scored again based on the sounds of things, but Keith smiled down at his daughter for a little while longer.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Thanks, Rach,” he said.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“I’m just telling the truth.” Rachel grinned, “plus, I love all my niblings and I definitely wouldn’t say no to more of them.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Keith laughed. “What about you, though?” Keith knew a bit about Rachel and her ex-fiancé, but only from Lance and semi-secretly. According to Lance, her ex hadn’t wanted kids, which was a dealbreaker for Rachel. “You’re great with Stella, and the older kids, too.” Rachel was the ultimate babysitter, honestly, and the only reason she didn’t do it more often was because her residency at the hospital meant she wasn’t free a lot.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“It’s… not for me,” Rachel responded after a pause, “at least, not yet. After Brandon… I know I want kids, but he was right when he said I couldn’t take care of one—yet. I need to finish my residency and get a stable job first, hopefully find a husband… And then kids, if that’s still possible, which I hope it will be.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“You have time,” Keith assured her. “You’re young, smart, and pretty, plus you’re a McClain so I’m sure you have no shortage of friends and admirers.” Rachel laughed at that. </span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“I’m pretty sure not everyone thinks the same way about us as you do, Mr. Kogane-McClain,” she teased, even though legally that wasn’t his name, “but you’re right. I rushed into things with Brandon, but I don’t need to. I can take my time. Plus,” Rachel lifted Stella into a tight hug, which Stella looked delighted to receive, “I know any of Lance’s kids are all but mine.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">Stella babbled at her, as if in agreement.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Well, you’re definitely Stella’s favourite Tía,” Keith said, “although Allura might fight you on that.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Allura lives all the way on Altea, so I better beat her.” Rachel set Stella down again, and she leaned against her Tía tiredly. Keith had half a mind to ask Rachel to keep her awake so that she’d sleep through the night, but with the inevitable sugar crash and hours still to go before bedtime he figured it was a lost cause. Stella could sleep whenever she wanted today; Keith could bear the consequences. </span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Also, since I’m taking my time and all, and you might be wanting another kid…” Rachel shrugged, “well, I’m willing to surrogate if you two wanted to go that way.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“What?”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Don’t look at me like that! Lance already knows; when he came out as bisexual, I told him he could always ask me to surrogate if he ever wanted to start a family with another man. And I know things are different, what with you two adopting Stella, but if ever you wanted a biological child of your own, well, I’m your woman.” At Keith’s shocked silence, Rachel grinned and continued, “Lance and I aren’t identical twins, but we’re still twins, so if I was your surrogate you’d get as close to a biological child between you and Lance as you’d ever get—possibly even including Veronica.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“I—…wow, Rachel. Thank you.” Keith had never really thought very hard about having his own biological children, but the thought of <em>Lance and his</em> biological children, more McClain kids like Nadia, Silvio, and Julia, that was… more desirable an idea than Keith was prepared for.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“I mean, it’s just an option, for when you’re thinking about it in the future. And like I said, Lance’s kids are practically my kids, too, and I don’t mind that being genetically true.” Rachel smiled. “You deserve another kid if you want one, and I would be honoured to help you if and when that time comes.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">It was only a bit after that that the rest of their siblings—sans Veronica, who was on a mission—arrived, prompting a halt in the game as the kids went to greet their parents. Lance came to kiss a sleepy Stella on the cheek and grab some water, grinning despite his exhaustion at keeping up with the children.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“You three having fun?” He asked.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Loads,” Rachel replied with a responding grin.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Keith? You okay there?” Lance asked when Keith didn’t respond immediately.</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">“Yeah,” Keith said, “yeah, I’m great.”</span>
</p>
<p class="p4">
  <span class="s1">He didn’t say much else as Lance was dragged back into the game despite the darkened sky, watching Lance play with his niblings, tiring them out in time for dinner. For a brief moment, he allowed himself to imagine Stella, grown up like Nadia, playing with her younger siblings and her father. He supposed he could handle children even when he was outnumbered and they were hyperactive balls of energy; as long as Lance was right beside him, Keith could handle anything.</span>
</p>
<p class="p5">
  <span class="s1">And maybe—just maybe, if Lance wanted—he wouldn’t mind finding more than one sibling for Stella.</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Thanks for reading!</p>
<p>I'm not sure how big their family is going to end up! I'm thinking 3-4 kids? Let me know what you think, and maybe some ideas for names?</p>
<p>I'm still not sure how much I'm going to be writing for this series, since it's now a series. I've got a few more fic ideas (all while Stella is still young) that I'm working on, but we'll see how things pan out.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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